AndyRKett said:

The latest V70 is a car dating back to 2007 so not exactly new and now discontinued.

Yes plenty of car companies are moving all the buttons to big touchscreens, however and rather ironically the likes of BMW and VW, the new Fiesta, and other fords, all companies you hate, are still keeping traditional heating controls and steering wheel controls etc.

Most new infotainment systems use things like carplay and android auto, meaning you dont need to touch the screen while driving as you just tell siri or google what you want it todo.

Cars are now coming with Amazon's alexa built in and able to control features of the car all without taking your hands off the wheel or your eyes off the road.

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I just don't get the point of that. I like to have a few creature comforts in a car, and I do enjoy owning an Eleganza, but that is just pointless. That is what I consider to be change for the sake of change, and not a useful evolution for the car.

puntofan01 said:

This was a 2012 V70, and I thought the gearbox was a Volvo design? At risk of sounding old fashioned again, operating the clutch and gearlever is part of the enjoyment, and any automatic takes that away.

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And until I tried a decent automatic I’d have agreed with you.

Do you have a full day planned tomorrow? If not, go to a BMW dealership and take an auto box 1er or 3er out and you’ll see how relaxing it is to not have to stir your own gears on a long run.

I do indeed have a full day planned, I'll be working in my flat. Every time I drive my old Grande, I actively enjoy stirring my own gears. And that includes on longer runs.

puntofan01 said:

but that is just pointless. That is what I consider to be change for the sake of change, and not a useful evolution for the car.

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the mistake you're making is assuming its for the sake of it, hundreds of people are killed every year or injured, not looking at the road fiddling with buttons and dials. historically thousands and thousands have been killed in this way.

Might seem stupid to you but it does save lives.
Also the more you can do with your voice and the better it works, the less likely some muppet will pick up their phone while driving to just check that text or whatsapp, this could prevent someone slamming into the front of you at 60mph as they search for their dropped phone under the passenger seat.

Anything you can buy in a modern car like climate control and electric windows has been mostly unchanged and available on cars since the 60s and 70s. The real evolution has been in how we have developed in the last 20years to input and output huge amounts of data every day (sat nav, phone calls, appointments, messages, news, radio, music, podcasts and even teleconferencing on the go) and how the car helps us do that smartly and safely.

My personal view is that it's people's attitudes that need to change, not the car changing to meet the drivers' attitude. As soon as you pull away, your priority should be driving: Facebook, text messages, WhatsApp etc should be forgotten about all whilst that car is moving. Even before I had the Grande, if my phone went off, I ignored it. It's not rocket science!

puntofan01 said:

My personal view is that it's people's attitudes that need to change, not the car changing to meet the drivers' attitude. As soon as you pull away, your priority should be driving: Facebook, text messages, WhatsApp etc should be forgotten about all whilst that car is moving. Even before I had the Grande, if my phone went off, I ignored it. It's not rocket science!

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Your personal view won’t help you if someone does run into you. You have strong opinions of how other people should behave but no willingness to concede anything yourself, so you have to ask yourself why should anyone listen to your point of view, you’re not interested in anyone else’s?

I have at least an hour commute to work every day and need to make the most of that time, I can spend it solving problems, learning new things and sorting out plans, making calls, setting reminders and appointments, all without taking my eyes off the road or hands off the steering wheel.
When your driven hundreds of cars and covered hundreds of thousands of miles, sometimes you don’t get in a car and want to sit there trying to savour every gear change in some utopian ideologic dream world, sometimes you just want to get somewhere as quickly as possible without hassle.

It's all very well and good not needing to take your hands off the wheel, but if your mind is still away from the road, then you should really consider public transport, quite frankly...

AndyRKett said:

I do t think anyone is saying “it’s a crap engine” but the point of this thread is that these new small turbo engines are not really getting any better economy figures to an equivalent non turbo engine.

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I'll get to TA's fuel economy a little later.

I think some of your criticisms about TA are valid, i.e. adding an extra layer of complexity with the turbo and multiair unit; not a particularly robust engine (prone to wrong oil or irregular service).

But to be fair to it, we have to discuss its plus points as well, such as:
. there's the naturally aspirated version
. lighter and smaller engine, yet powerful: the 105 version means bhp to displacement ratio of 120 hp/L, which must be one of the highest of any mainstream cars around. Very few can pass the 100 hp/L mark. Renault's 0.9 TCE, for example, puts out 90 hp = 100 hp/L

And as you mentioned in the post, perhaps this trend of 'complicated' engines are becoming a requirement in Europe to meet strict emission targets. Expensive oil and regular servicing are just the price to pay, in TA's case.

Which brings me to what I regard as the biggest benefit of TA, which is interestingly also the subject of much of your criticism: fuel economy. I issued a challenge in my previous post to find any family car (petrol) that can better 500L TA's real life mpg of 42; or if that's not difficult or the term 'family car' is too loose, I can make it more challenging: a 7-seater petrol that has better real life mpg than 500L MPW's (same figure). Honest John Real MPG website is a good arbitrator.

I completely accept that other people need to make arrangements for their job, but it's kinda horrifying that they're doing it whilst in control of a lump of metal travelling at 60mph...

I don't have a problem with change and development, as long as it's a genuine improvement. Adding increasingly complex infotainment systems and driver aids that can be defeated by sensors getting dirty doesn't qualify as improvement to me.

With regards to saying I have no aspirations, I genuinely pity people like yourself. I'd hate to be someone who's never content.

With regards to calling me a troll, well, you have to count yourself as 1 of those too, especially as you're renowned for being quite possibly the most insulting person on this forum, along with maxi.

Guys, I'm very much a newbie in this forum, but I'm quite sure that noone enjoys reading these exchanges of personal insults and name calling?

Can we get back to talking about cars and engines?

redetris said:

Guys, I'm very much a newbie in this forum, but I'm quite sure that noone enjoys reading these exchanges of personal insults and name calling?

Can we get back to talking about cars and engines?

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It’s hard to have a proper discussion with someone who thinks that cars aren’t advancing at all. It’s like arguing with a brick wall.

I for instance think that the facelift interior looks horrible with a screen in the dash, but I recognise that if you don’t have a screen on the dash then you’re behind the times.

There have been massive and very useful leaps made in the last 10 years. Technology in cars has become easier and safer to use.

If someone thinks that an Grande Punto eleganza is the height of useable luxury then good for them for having such low aspirations that are so easily satisfied.

redetris said:

Can we get back to talking about cars and engines?

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Yes.

Any more posts in this thread which are not in some way relevant to the TA or its engine will be deleted. To save wear and tear on my delete key, anyone making more than one such post in this thread will receive a 24hr timeout from this forum, without further notice.

If you want to debate the merits and safety implications of driver operated infotainment systems, there are other places on this forum where you can do so.

StevenRB45 said:

The testing regime was..and still is to an extent a joke though due to having to put all vehicles including buses and hgvs through the test so the acceleration phases are unnaturally slow for cars.

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Cars don't use the same test cycle as trucks and busses. The real reason why the accelerations of the old test cycle (NEDC) are so slow is that the main part of the test originated about 50 years ago. The test had to be easy doable with cars that were very common in those days, like for example the original FIAT 500. Any idea how fast that car accelerated with only 18 hp?

AGH1965 said:

44 mpg. I find such a value insane for such a car. I don't know what you need to do to reach such a poor average.

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StevenRB45 said:

Perhaps..however I sincerely doubt any of the dutch cars ever encountered anything like my commute..which is 2 miles flat, followed/preceded by 4 miles in which you gain/lose 550 feet of altitude and .5 mile of gaining/losing 150 feet altitude. Downhill sections "coasting in gear" translates to "riding the brakes all the way down using energy to heat the wheel arches" and uphill well it's all 60mph so in a 85bhp TA you'll be taking big bites of the pedal on the right just to keep up with traffic.

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You are absolutely right! Not the whole world is as flat as my country. Of course that influences fuel economy.

306maxi said:

I for instance think that the facelift interior looks horrible with a screen in the dash, but I recognise that if you don’t have a screen on the dash then you’re behind the times.

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Agree with this, I have had all four versions of the dash. The original gave it a Good classic look. The 5" screens were OK, but used a zx80 processor I am sure. The hd7 7" screen is very good, the GPS in particular is very good, It picks up on routes that only a person with local knowledge would do. It does have some stupid screen layout options though. The home screen doesn't have a direct link to the GPS but must be accessed via unconnected first, minor but irritating.

It's also weird that the version with the best GPS, can also use android auto, which is largely redundant.

lsgraham_uk said:

Agree with this, I have had all four versions of the dash. The original gave it a Good classic look. The 5" screens were OK, but used a zx80 processor I am sure.

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Ah the ZX80 - the first computer I ever used - white, not capable of moving graphics and the awful keypad. Nostalgia burst.

AndyRKett said:

So if you want a small engined turbo, petrol car that achieves its claimed MPG figures buy a large engined turbo diesel, like a nice BMW 3-Series.

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This is the most ridiculous advice I have ever heard. You are so obsessed with the difference between real world mpg and claimed mpg, that you forget about the most important thing in life: You can spend your money only once!

For the price of the cheapest BMW 316d I can buy a very, very nice 500 with TA and enough petrol for driving 150k miles. So why care if the real world mpg of the 316d are close to the advertised? Unless the 316d doesn't use fuel at all, the 500 with TA is a much better investment!

ronmanager said:

Ah the ZX80 - the first computer I ever used - white, not capable of moving graphics and the awful keypad. Nostalgia burst.

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I have in the loft a zx128k with tape deck, proper speed demon.

lsgraham_uk said:

I have in the loft a zx128k with tape deck, proper speed demon.

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Many many many hours spent typing in 'games' programmes from Computer & Video Games magazine then trying to find where you'd made a mistake in all those lines of text.

I didn't really want to get into this thread because there are certain contrarians that will argue one thing one week, then argue the opposite the next.

AGH1965 said:

This is the most ridiculous advice I have ever heard. You are so obsessed with the difference between real world mpg and claimed mpg, that you forget about the most important thing in life: You can spend your money only once!

For the price of the cheapest BMW 316d I can buy a very, very nice 500 with TA and enough petrol for driving 150k miles. So why care if the real world mpg of the 316d are close to the advertised? Unless the 316d doesn't use fuel at all, the 500 with TA is a much better investment!

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Andy Numpty said 'large' TD BMW.

https://www.honestjohn.co.uk/realmpg/bmw/3-series-f30-2012/335d

Gosh, said Numpty, 74% sure is a lot better than 71%

https://www.honestjohn.co.uk/realmpg/fiat/500-2007/09-twinair-105

If you do the maths, a 500 105 will cost you 1.68l/100km more than advertised. In CO2 that's a .35 tons per 10,000km

The 335d will cost you a staggering 2.2l/100km more than advertised. In CO2 that's an even more staggering .57 tons.

What's even worse is that a small city car doing short trips is always going to struggle 'real world' vs a big diesel that's much more likely to be doing long journeys. Like for like that delta will only get worse.

Numpties don't realise that MPG is a measure of diminishing returns, can't understand basic math, nor do they ever acknowledge that diesels put out much more CO2 than petrols - they just like to argue.

Certain Numpties seem to think 70mpg official, 50mpg real world, OMG that's 20mpg! A V8 Range Rover uses 20mpg! A Fiat 500 uses a whole Range Rover's worth of fuel more than it should! In fact Numpties, it's costing the owner the same as a 20mpg car getting 18mpg. 'Only 2mpg off, that's pretty good' mused Numpty.

The number of faults listed on Honest John for the 3 Series is pretty staggering for a 'premium' car costing what it does.

The really funny thing is that of course, diesels only match their ratings when driven extremely gently. That EE video also describes every turbo diesel in existence, while petrols may add fuel under boost (say going from 14.7 to 16:1), it's nowhere near the level of diesel (going from around 100:1 to 25:1). My diesel gets it's best economy in gridlock, pity it drops like a rock if keeping up with regular traffic.

Overall, downsizing works 100%. UFI was such a 'disaster' I went on to two even more drastically 'downsized' engines:

Fiat 500 TA= 875cc/ton (incidentally, ever wonder why the odd capacity? - it's actually the thermodynamically 'ideal' cylinder size). I get 50-70MPG. Inspired by this discussion I drove it like I stole it for 50km in the hills, couldn't get it below 50mpg. You'd have to be truly reckless or live in a place with no speed limits to do worse. Best I've seen is 70MPG (suburban)- tank averages are in the 60 range. If anything the HJ real world figures sing the praises of the TA105- same economy as a 1.2 with 30% more power for free - I only wish the 105 had been sold here.

Renault 1.6 petrol= 0.666cc/ton. Worst peak hour city commute was under 30mpg - seriously impressive for 2.4 tons and a .45Cd. Lifetime average was 35mpg, 99% city/cbd use. Much better than anything that heavy should do - certainly better than the 2.3 petrol (24mpg!) and 2.4 diesel that I drove prior.

Renault 1.6 diesel= 760cc/ ton, best ever cbd commute of 60mpg. Not bad for 2.1 tons! Tank averages 38-42mpg. Way better than the 2.5 and 2.4 (28mpg) diesels before it.

I've been on drives with enough 'enthusiast' Numpties to know not to care what MPG they get. They nail the throttle in a straight line and slow to walking speed at the slightest hint of a corner. Non-enthusiast Numpties can't anticipate three feet ahead of their bumpers, leave their cars idling for hours on end (literally saw a guy idling for 2 hours in a car park the other day) and never so much as check tyre pressures. Why should I care what the Numpties get?

If I'm researching a car I'll look at the top 1 or 2 cars I find on fuel reporting sites - that's what I can expect to get.